King in the Castle

The Kings Home Opener had an interesting light show.  I didn't quite understand why someone decided to use green lights instead of something like, oh, I don't know....purple.

(Photo by Robert Meggers/Getty Images)

I'm in the Matrix!

It was definitely unexpected, a little off-putting, kinda cool, somewhat interesting.  Yeah, I still don't know what I think of it.  I wonder if it will be used at every game or if it was just for the home opener.  I was sad they didn't use the on-ice projector for highlights, but hopefully it's because they want to show highlights from the current season and there just haven't been too many yet. 

The display of the player introductions on the HD jumbotron got kinda screwed up.  Jake Muzzin's name was never shown, Rob Scuderi's was shown twice and I think Ryan Smyth was briefly shown twice before they fixed it and showed the correct person.  But the weirdest thing was the castle that the players walked out of.  

 (Photo by Harry How/Getty Images)

But where's the moat?  

It looked so juvenile and all I could think of every time they showed the players walking out of it was:

King in the Castle, King in the Castle!!

Coyotes Feed On Kings in Home Opener

Woah, the Kings home opener on Saturday Oct 3rd against the Phoenix Coyotes was one huge disappointment. Kings fans were anxiously waiting for this night because the Coyotes seemed like such easy prey to start off the '09-'10 season with a much wanted win.

Everything before the national anthem set up what was thought to be a great game. LA Live was abuzz with a they're-so-awesome-'cause-it's-so-ridiculous rock cover band and drink and food specials at the numerous restaurants. The Husband and I were tempted to eat at the ESPN Zone but we decided to feast on comfort food at Lawry's because of the smaller crowd and I took advantage of the $3 beer special for fans in a Kings jersey.

LA Live...not too shabby

The server in the Premier section was incredibly attentive, which made ordering through him worth every penny of the half-off retail price I paid for my ticket through StubHub. The pre-game jumbotron celebration of great moments in Kings history set up the moment for the start of the season, the 10th one at Staples Center. But all the momentum kinda came to a screeching halt when national anthem singer Lisa Loeb sang "God Bless America"...woah...what?? Lisa Loeb chose to sing "God Bless America? I know singers have a choice as to which song to sing and I know "The Star-Spangled Banner" is a difficult vocal number with myriad opportunities for failure, but "The Star-Spangled Banner" gives the arena an energy and rush that "God Bless America" does not deliver. Lisa Loeb was fine, nothing extraordinary, nothing horrible, but she did Staples Center, the Kings, and Kings fans no favor by passing over "The Star-Spangled Banner" at the home opener. Of course she is not to blame for the Kings' pitiful outing, but she was the start of many failures over the course of the evening.

The Kings turned over the puck way too many times during the game. Phoenix had a lot of odd-man rushes and easy break outs. The defensemen were much more active on offense than in the past, but it hurt the team when the Kings turned over the puck and there was only one defenseman left to fend off the opposition. Drew Doughty was surprisingly shaky in the game; he was called for two penalties and had several turnovers that left him out of position and scrambling to recover.

Jonathan Quick had two key saves in the game, but other than that looked average. However, it's difficult to gauge his performance given how poorly the Kings played in front of him.

The one highlight of the game was the Kings power play. The Kings scored all three of their goals on the power play and had what seemed like well over half of their scoring chances come while on the man advantage.

It was frustrating to see the Kings try to close the gap on the scoreboard only to have Phoenix immediately regain their multi-goal lead. Watching the Kings lose so decisively sort of felt like the off-season never happened. But I have to believe that the Kings are better than last year. This year the Kings don't have the dead weight of Kyle Calder, Denis Gauthier, and (it pains me to write it) Derek Armstrong. The Kings have 3 very strong lines, and a 4th line that could be beneficial with a promising Trevor Lewis at center. The Kings need to be disciplined and smart, knowing when to take chances and when to stay home and play with more intensity and be more physical. This Kings team is better than what they showed last night and will do better in the future. It's just one game, 81 more to go.

One Week Till Frozen Fury

(source)

which means, only 2 more weeks till the season starts!!!

I still need to get tickets to the home opener....

Starting the Season 0 for 2

I knew the Kings were screwed when the NHL schedule was released during the off season and it revealed that the Kings would open the season with a home-and-home series against the San Jose Sharks. It seemed very unlikely that the Kings would be able to handle the experienced and very skilled Sharks team. Even with backup Brian Boucher tending net in Game 2 the Kings couldn't even come close to taking the upper hand.

Kings fans were super excited to see Blake

Both games featured sub-sub-sub-par playing by the entire Kings lineup, which fully exposed the complete lack of chemistry. The season opener on Saturday had most of the lines rather unchanged throughout the game. However in the home opener on Sunday, the guys were mixed around forming various combinations among the forwards, and even on defense, reminiscent of those horrible Crawford days. Kopitar received a 10-minute misconduct which forced Murray to find players to rotate in his spot during that duration. But since no one line could consistently be counted on to execute any sustained pressure, I suppose it's no surprise that he mixed up the lines hoping to spark some kind of offense.

LaBarbera looked average in the first game and better in the second game less the moment he allowed the lone goal. There were several scary scrums in the second game but he and the guys in front of him always managed to keep the puck out of the net. He even looked solid on shots that went through traffic and rarely let up many rebounds. But, of course, the one shot that beat him looked so easy to stop, low to the near (glove) side, that it seemed inconceivable that the puck was able to sail by him, but yet it did.

The defense encountered so much trouble clearing the zone and, along with the forwards, was so miserable at connecting passes through the neutral zone to begin the attack. The Kings had so much difficulty getting shots on goal because they failed time and time again at crossing the opponents' blueline and gathering the puck on the dump and chase. The passing deteriorated as the game went on to the point where they couldn't even make one clean pass as the clock slowly ticked to zero among boos resonating through Staples Center. Seeing the Kings getting booed in the home opener was brutal. It was even more brutal knowing that the biggest cheer happened when the score of the Dodgers game (7-2 win over Philly) was revealed on the Jumbotron. It doesn't even matter that two goals were disallowed (man in the crease and kicking the puck in the net) in the second period, because the Kings didn't deserve to win. So many things went wrong in these two games and hopefully the Kings will find ways to quickly remediate the issues otherwise it'll be a very long, excruciating season.

x-posted to HLOG